By Rev. Michael J. Christensen
Don’t be naïve: what’s being sold right now in renewed negotiations with Iran— and in the wider conflicts touching Israel, Gaza, Lebanon, and Ukraine— is not really peace. It’s a deal.
Cap uranium enrichment at a negotiated threshold. Reopen inspections. In exchange, ease sanctions, unfreeze assets, lower the temperature. Declare a breakthrough. Claim victory.
We’ve seen this script before. It’s essentially a reboot— an updated version of the same nuclear framework under President Biden, repackaged for a new political moment.
To be sure, deals like this can slow a crisis. They can buy time. They may even avert immediate catastrophe.
But they don’t reach the deeper fractures driving the conflict in the first place—generational wounds, historical grievances, cycles of injustice and retaliation.
The biblical prophet Jeremiah would call it out for what it is:
“They have treated the wound of my people lightly, saying ‘Peace, peace,’ when there is no peace.”
Call it peace lite.
A thinner, faster, more convenient version of peace— engineered for headlines, not for healing. This time it’s wrapped in the language of “peace through strength”— the signature motto of strongman Donald Trump: apply pressure, force concessions, close the deal. But brute strength can coerce a signature, but it can’t create trust.
Here in San Diego, especially on The Point, we know the difference. We live near a military base. War and peace aren’t abstractions here. They show up in our neighborhoods, our congregations, our conversations. We’ve seen what happens when conflicts are “resolved” on paper but remain unresolved in the human soul.
Last month’s “No Kings” demonstration in OB tapped into that awareness. It wasn’t just about one political figure. It was a rejection of the deeper assumption that peace can be imposed from the top down— by force, by ego, or by deal-making alone. That approach always leaves someone out.
On Good Friday, we walked a different path. Along Sunset Cliffs and through Church Row, more than 200 people joined the public pilgrimage I described in the San Diego Union-Tribune: “A Different Kind of Good Friday in Ocean Beach”
We stopped at eight “stations on the street”—naming suffering in plain sight.
And at each stop, we asked a question no negotiation table wants to ask: Who’s in your circle of concern—and who gets left out? In religious terms: “Who did Jesus die for–and who did he not?”
Because every deal leaves someone out.
Sanctions get lifted, but ordinary people remain economically strained. Security is negotiated, but dignity is deferred. Stability is declared, but injustice is absorbed—quietly, behind the scenes.
That’s not peace. That’s containment. And containment has a short shelf life.
When peace is reduced to a transaction, it stabilizes the surface while leaving deeper wounds untreated. And untreated wounds don’t disappear—they fester and spread. They resurface in more volatile forms.
We’ve watched that cycle repeat for decades.
Which is why Ocean Beach— with its mix of veterans, activists, skeptics, and spiritual seekers— ought to be deeply skeptical of anything marketed as quick peace.
Real peace— the biblical vision of shalom —doesn’t work that way.
Jeremiah said it this way: “Seek the shalom of the community where you are…for in its shalom, you will find your shalom.” (Jeremiah 29:7)
Shalom peace isn’t handed down by powerful leaders. It’s built from the ground up— through truth-telling, reconciliation, and long-term repair.
It asks more of us than simply choosing sides or cheering for a deal. It asks us to widen our circle of love and concern.
That’s the deeper challenge behind what I wrote earlier in the OB Rag: “Binding the Strongman: An Easter Warning”
Not meeting power with more power—but disarming it with truth, accountability, and a refusal to leave anyone outside the circle.
So the next time you hear our leaders declare that peace is just around the corner, ask a few harder questions:
Who wins— and who loses— from this deal?
(And yes, follow the money.)
Who is being asked to absorb the cost? (Is this just?)
What wounds are being covered over instead of healed?
Because if it’s just a deal, it won’t last.
And when it breaks—and it will, if the deeper work isn’t done— it won’t be the dealmakers who pay the price. It will be the same people who always pay the price…
Rev. Michael J. Christensen, Ph.D., is a clergy member of the Point Loma Peninsula Faith Leaders and Professor of Theology at Northwind Theological Seminary. His work focuses on cultivating shalom along historic Church Row in Ocean Beach. Church Row OB https://churchrowob.org/
